The Strays
by Sir Jerowin of Fan-fiction
Summary: Kel finds herself awake in the middle of the night feeling hungry and lonely. But the feelings are not hers! A new species of immortal has appeared in the world and has attached itself to Kel.


The Strays

By Sir Jerowin

All rights go to the wonderful Tamora Pierce

I suddenly found myself awake and alert. I didn't know what woke me but I could feel a great pain and hunger coming from somewhere. I felt a compelling need to go find the source, so throwing on some breeches and walking out of headquarters I went on a hunt. As I walked out I stood still to try and get my bearings on the feeling.

I live in the back of the town far from the heart of the city. from the privies near the back of the town. Getting past my property there is a construction site, so they have privies for the workers-kind of gross but beggars can't be choosers-I hurried over to the site and tried to locate the source of the pain. However there were two sets of emotions, one filled with pain, and the other with fear.

I looked into a pothole dug for a pond and saw what looked like two intertwined snakes. One of them seemed injured, and the other one seemed to be guarding the other.

The one guarding looked up at me with oddly intelligent eyes, I couldn't explain how I knew that the snakes were the source of the emotion I was feeling, I just could.

"I know someone who can help" I spoke softly, not wanting to frighten them. The two of them looked up at me and nodded. Slowly, I reached down to pick up the injured one.

As soon as I touched it, the creature began to move and wrapped around my hand and arm loosely. I stood as still as I could, the uninjured snake slithered over to my other hand and did the same thing. Steadily, I stood up and started to walk back to headquarters.

As I walked in, I realized how fatigued I was and barely made it to my room. Once there I lay down and let the snakes join me on the bed. I must have been exhausted to let potentially dangerous animals lay in bed next to me, but I was close to passing out. So, all I did was let them stay by me while I drifted off to sleep..

I woke up to Neal's pounding on the door. "Kel, wake up! It's 9:00 already," he yelled.

I crawled out of bed and stumbled over to the door, not even noticing the two snakes wrapped loosely around my neck.

I pulled the door open as I yawned.

"Ah!" Neal yelped.

"What?" I yawned, rubbing my eyes.

"You have snakes around your neck!" Neal voice was filled with fear.

"Oh, I guess they're still there."

"You mean you knew they were there?" Neal asked incredulously.

"Yes, I found them last night when I couldn't sleep."

As I explained what had happened last night, the uninjured snake seemed to wake up, and look at Neal blearily. Suddenly, it leaped at Neal and sprouted butterfly wings from behind its head. A strange humming sound filled the air and it hissed at Neal who fell backwards in shock.

Strangely, I could feel that the snake was protecting me from Neal, who was angry with me.

"Hey! Leave him be, he was just worried about me."

It looked back and returned to its previous place on my neck, right next to the uninjured snake.

Neal looked up at me in shock and stuttered, "W-what was that!"

"I don't know the name of this species, but I am going to guess it is an immortal, what with the wings and all," I spoke softly as I stroked it's head to calm it and get it to settle down. "At any rate, I am going to get dressed and meet you outside."

I shut the door in his face, turned around, and muttered, "You two need a name…"

It looked up at me and nodded.

"How about Pip?" I asked as I started to put on some clothes. I could sense approval coming from the newly christened Pip.

As I slowly removed the other snake to let it sleep I tried to think of an appropriate name.

"Now for your friend… would Silver work?" I looked at Pip for approval, and Pip seemed to like it.

It occurred to me, that I don't know how to determine the gender of snakes, but I dismissed the thought quickly. I would find out soon enough when I see Daine at the wedding in two weeks. I finished getting dressed, settled Pip on my shoulder and walked towards the mess. "Collecting more strays, are you?" Dom called leaning on the doorframe. He and his squad were staying at New Hope until the wedding. I nodded and kept walking drawing stares from just about everyone. As I walked into the mess, I looked around and spotted Neal and my heart started beating faster. I looked away and spotted Tobe and made my way over, he did not notice as I sat across from him. He looked up paled and promptly fell out of his seat. "A little warning next time you bring a snake in here!" I smiled at him and said, "Well then you should have paid attention and you would not have been surprised." Looking mollified Tobe said, "Alright as long as it doesn't bite me!" I chuckled and kept on eating my meal. We needed to get on the preparations to go to Fort Steadfast for the wedding. These weeks would be fun!

 **A/N Special thanks to my reviewers CrazyAngel and Daphne for helping me fix my horrible mistakes.**


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